Thursday, July 17, 2014

Steam Punk Quilt Blocks - Fifth Set with Construction Notes

I've been taking photos of each block as they are finished and cropping the edges. That makes it very easy to create these collages in Picasa. Each collage inspires a slightly different set of blocks: lighter, darker, brighter, quieter. Previously I simply took photos of layouts on my design wall. Cropping and collaging with Picasa is a big improvement because it approximates the sewing edge. You can even add a sashing effect with any solid color by increasing the grid spacing.

Steam Punk blocks with sashing

While we hope our blocks finish square that is not always the case. Especially curved seam blocks. After making a few I decided to alter my cutting method for the quarter circle corner pieces by cutting the outer sides of those pieces slightly larger than the template. I didn't change any other templates and still sewed quarter-inch seams.

Quarter Circle piece cut with larger outer seams

The extra seam allowance in the outer corners leaves enough room to square the blocks even when my sewing pulls one corner in.

Top right corner of this block is not square. But larger seam allowance allows trimming.

Then I use my square ruler to trim the block to 9.5 inches with a quarter-inch seam allowance past the blade edges.

Steam Punk block ready to trim to size

I considered extending the seam allowance on the triangles also but using the correct size helped ensure the blades didn't get too big.